A Warm Place

Copied this from my other blog: thought somebody might enjoy it!

The Arduino, as described by the Arduino Homepage, is "an open-source electronics prototyping platform based on flexible, easy-to-use hardware and software." What that means to you may differ with your experience, but to me the Arduino is a little chunk of Italian-made circuit board that can make LEDs blink, can tell how bright the ambient light is, can run motors and mechanisms, and otherwise make electronic components do cool stuff.

There seems to be no limit to what people are capable of doing with one of these, with the addition of the right components. Just search YouTube for Arduino and you'll see what I mean. LED cubes dancing to music, robots that seek out the light – one of the guys from our LUG used his to have his dehumidifier tweet whenever it's full, and again to thank him for emptying it. If you would like to follow his dehumidifier, you can do so: Mark's Dehumidifier.

So, as a step towards building my Linux-powered robot to satisfy a New Years resolution, I picked one up. I also bought a couple wires, LEDs and other random components to test with. It arrived yesterday, and pictures will follow (once I get my camera some batteries).

So far I haven't gotten too much accomplished. I've caused a single LED to blink on a schedule, and to react to the light level of the room using a photoresistor. I've also realized that I don't remember anything from Digital in high school – big suprise. Most of last night was spent looking up resistor color codes and re-learning the basics of electronics.

All things considered, I'm very optimistic about how it's going. I'll keep posting progress here for anyone that's interested!

Hello everyone,

I haven't written in some time, yes? Well, this warrants it. I just wanted to let everyone know that there is a very nasty virus out there on the web. It's only popped up on a couple web sites, but once you visit certain web sites, it immediately infects you and makes you feel like you're seven years old again.

Sounds crazy, right? Well, I speak from experience. I've already caught it from the following web site: http://www.iwatchstuff.com/2009/03/where_the_wild_things_are_trai.php.

But really, in all seriousness, this movie looks fantastic. I was terribly worried when I heard they were going to be making a movie out of one of my favorite childhood stories, Where the Wild Things Are, but the trailer set me at ease. Everything is live action, no cheesy computer graphics, and they have The Polyphonic Spree playing the music for the trailer. Frickin' sold.

I can't wait until this comes out.

I am going to vote for Barack Obama, because I agree with his ideals and what he plans to do for this country and I disagree with John McCain on most of his, especially his plan to stay in Iraq until we've "won".

If anyone tell me that Barack Obama should not be president because he will be assassinated, I will be required by my belief in the theory of evolution to kick you, in whatever genitals you may possess, hard enough to assure that you will be the end of your genetic line. This may require repeated kickings, steel-toed boots, etc.

In addition, it will really lower my opinion of you as a person.